see you around

It is no secret that I haven't been a fan of our three car situation.

For better, according to me, and for worse, according to Brad- we have some new found realestate in our driveway.

The Jetta is sold.  And yes, I smiled while I wrote that.

No one should ever question Brad's sentimental nature.  We did in fact have a family photo shoot with his "first car".  In some ways, it seems a bit like this was his first love.  We went through a grieving process.  Talked through the good and the bad times.  We talked about how Brad grew his family from one, to two, to three.

He even somewhere deep down thought that there was a chance that this would be Lillie's first car.  Well, I guess in someways it was.

Adios Jetta.  I'm sure we will be seeing you around.

joy.

nothing could fill my heart like these photos.

Yes, that is my family room.

drying, originally uploaded by CelebrateTheNest.

Sorry it has been a few days...

As many of you know, it rained, and rained and rained here. Well, by Thursday evening everyone was in a bad mood from constantly being soaking wet and cold.

I walked in the house- it was about 10pm Thursday evening. I had been at a volunteer commitment. And I stepped inside my warm house to a big SQUISH. At first I thought, man my shoes are really wet. And then I thought, wow, the mat at the door is really wet too. And then I noticed that not only was the mat and myself soaking wet, but my carpet was soaking wet too.

Apparently, our brick gave up and formed a fun slide for rain drops to use to enter our warm home. Thanks for that.

I pulled back the carpet Thursday evening to a puddle. Sigh. And thus the process begun.

We are currently in the final stages of drying out and getting ready to put things back together. But as you all know, it is slow going getting anything extra done around here.

This can wait. But did I mention that somehow during this mess our TV decided to call it quits too. I'm not sure that can wait.

Thank You

Thank you Grandpa and to all the veterans and their families who sacrificed for my freedom.

The Veterans History Project, housed in the Library of Congress, is a really cool chronicle of the service memories of veterans.  Looks like Grandpa Gist was interviewed in 2004 for the project- they video taped his interview.

Precious memories captured.  Check it out at the link below...

http://lcweb2.loc.gov/diglib/vhp/bib/47023

Best family photo ever.

On Friday night, Kevin(my brother) and Kelsey hosted their second annual Halloween pumpkin carving party.  We happen to have some talented pumpkin carvers in our family.

Well, at the end of the evening our family decided to take a group photo.  Everyone else had left, so Brad skillfully set the camera on a trash can and set the self-timer.

Now, self-timers on camera's always make me think of my Grandpa.  He set the self-timer and ran over to get in the shot.  As he got old and older her started not making it to "his position" by the time the photo was taken.  Thus, we always ended up with photos where Grandpa is half in half out.  It usually took about 10 or so shots to get a good one.

My husband has taken over this roll.  He sets the timer and runs to his spot.  He is rather tall, so he always ends up bending down the front or just blocking someone behind him.  Self-timers are great in theory, but seem to always make for interesting photos.

This particular self-timer incident is priceless.  The below photo was the last of several attempts to capture the family with the pumpkins.  Great idea, right?  Well,  I guess by this point my sweet cousin was tired of standing still and smiling beside her brother.  The result was one large bump on the head, one little girl in trouble and a priceless family photo.

It truly doesn't get any better than this.  Look carefully.

Jump, Jump, Jumparoo

                                                                                                                                                                  We borrowed- thanks Chesson- a Johnny Jump-Up!  Lillie's first experience was, well, lets just say uneventful.

Halloween

A Halloween full of pumpkins.